Sample Sources
The sources below are those contained in our three curated collections—covering themes of Passover, Gender Roles, and Holocaust Resistance. They represent a fraction of the thousands of sources that will be available when the full site launches in 2024.
Pavel’s Letters
Something is wrong between me and the story I want to write. Whatever subject I touch on, after five or four, sometimes even two pages, either the story throws me out or I throw myself out. As if I…
Cuckoo
So, like I said before, the only problem of Pnina was, she couldn’t have children. Everything else, a husband, money, work, vacations, she had. Only no children. Not that she and Yochanan didn’t try…
The Converts
On the holiest day we fast till sundown.
I watch the sun stand still
as the horizon edges towards it. Four hours to go.
The rabbi’s mouth opens and closes and opens.
I think: fish
and little steaming…
Lot (puru), Assyria
Lot (puru), Assyria, 8th century BCE. The inscription identifies this as a lot (puru—the Akkadian form of Hebrew pur, the word used in Esther 3:7) that belonged to an Assyrian official named Yahalu…
Prisoners, Naked and Bound, in Embossed Relief
Prisoners, naked and bound, in embossed relief, Assyria, Iron Age II, 9th century BCE. These prisoners, from a city in Syria, were conquered by the army of Shalmaneser III, King of Assyria (reigned…
Smoke
Can you imagine the air filled with smoke?
It was. The city was vanishing before noon
or was it earlier than that? I can’t say because
the light came from nowhere and went nowhere.
This was years…
Words Taken to Heart: Four Answers to One Question
You Will Be Wrapped in Silk
“And how do you merit to live so long?”
—Because I know there is need to consider.
At my birth someone said, “He will be wrapped
in silk.” And now the guests are…
Ivory-inlaid Chair
Ivory-inlaid chair, Salamis, Cyprus, 8th or 7th century BCE. Among the most beautiful items surviving from Israel and neighboring countries are the ivory carvings used for decorating furniture, among…
Fierce Attachments
My mother and I are out walking. I ask if she remembers the women in that building in the Bronx. “Of course,” she replies. I tell her I’ve always thought sexual rage was what made them so crazy.…
Budapest Diary: In Search of the Motherbook
Few children know the stories of their parents. During my childhood, I knew only that mine were an impossible match—which did not prevent my mother from spending day and night at my father’s bedside…
Men Doing Obeisance to Sennacherib
The six men from Lachish in this section of Sennacherib's palace relief are dressed quite differently from the men shown in other sections. They are clad in the simplest of short-sleeved, unbelted…
On Filling Shoes
I had a very unusual fifteenth birthday. During my birthday week, the end of April, I was traveling with 5,000 high school students from around the world, visiting concentration camps in Poland. I…